1. Field of Invention
The mouthpiece assembly of single reed wind instruments such as clarinets and saxophones embodies a mouthpiece body configured tubularly cylindrical at one end for being received and fastened on the body of the instrument and tapered toward the other end into a bill-like configuration with the wind passage aperture lying in a plane inclined to the axis of the mouthpiece, a striking reed disposed in contact with a flatted surface of the mouthpiece body and extending over the wind passage aperture for being caused to vibrate under wind pressure to variably constrict the air flow path to the aperture, and a banding device known as a ligature for clamping the reed on the mouthpiece body.
2. Description of the Prior Art
A ligature conventionally has one or two thumb screws for tightening the clamp about the mouthpiece body to forcibly press the reed into contact with the flatted surface of the mouthpiece body. A variety of presser feet designs have been provided on ligatures for contacting a reed including projecting lands which bear against the side extremities of the face of the reed to enable the center portion of the reed to vibrate; such lands have been provided with two contact posts each which may or may not be screw threaded to adjust seating pressure. A universally adjustable pivot mounting has also been provided on a ligature for contacting a reed to insure proper alignment of the seating plane of the reed with the flat on the mouthpiece body. Other presser feet have been provided to be adjustably movable on the ligature to accomodate reeds of various configurations. In all prior art devices, reeds have been retained by unyielding, non-resilient clamping either of a soft interfacing pad or of rigid presser feet with adjustment limited to that required to position the reed on the mouthpiece body without, however, providing independently, adjustably loaded, resilient cushioning of the force exerted by the clamp on each presser foot contacting the reed.